EIGHTY six percent of children seeking a primary school place in Thurrock for September were offered their first choice - however 139 children missed out altogether on any of their choices.

Thurrock Council co-ordinated the process for primary school places in the borough which, overall, saw 2,362 applications for 2,457 available places this year.

Of these, 86.1 per cent received an offer for their first preference and 5.8 per cent for their second.

Third preference offers made up 1.8 per cent meaning that 93.7 per cent of parents received one of their top three places and 94.7 out of a hundred were offered a place they had chosen as a preference for their child.

All parents seeking a place in reception have been made an offer despite the increase in applications seen in Thurrock and many parts of the country.

Carmel Littleton, the council’s director of children’s services, said: “The council’s co-ordination of applications and offers across all the borough’s schools has been successful as has its pupil place planning.

“For those parents who are unhappy with what they have been offered we will also co-ordinate the appeals process, but as can be seen from the figures, Thurrock Council’s admissions service has worked well with places offered to every child approaching school and in over nine out of ten cases at a preferred school.”